Our mid-Michigan community has been traumatized by the events surrounding disgraced doctor Larry Nassar. Survivors of Nassar’s abuse have come forward, testified, and were instrumental in the justice system putting the former Olympic and Michigan State doctor behind bars for the rest of his life.

Our community has stood beside these courageous survivors and have learned from their stories, their victim impact statements, and their calls for change. It is important that we now lead the way in sharing what we have learned from this horrific situation, so that others in our community, across our state, and throughout our nation, will be able to identify threats in their communities and believe those who say they have been — or are being — abused.

Larry Nassar is the worst documented example yet of what the FBI calls “Nice Guy Offenders” or “Pillars of the Community Offenders” or “Acquaintance Offenders” — he hid his abuse behind a medical license and national fame and prestige while grooming athletes, parents, coaches, teachers, pastors, family, and friends to believe that he he was a good guy, with his victims’ best interests at heart.

According to Jim Clemente – a member of the FBI/NYPD Sexual Exploitation of Children Task Force who was himself victimized as a teen by his basketball coach – approximately 90% of child sexual victimization crimes are committed by people the children know. People we trust. People we hand our children over to, voluntarily.

[Clemente is one of the panel members in our two forums that we are hosting on September 21 — see below.]

Nassar was methodical – skilled in grooming – and tested the waters with “innocent” behavior that hid his true motives. He would put up smoke screens and always have a convincing explanation if anyone ever questioned his intentions. He surfed along the edge with plausible deniability.

Nice guy offenders are experts at getting away with their crimes. They groom their victims – “this a normal medical procedure” or “we were just goofing around” – and they groom their communities. They know that while people are vigilant and on the lookout for the “monster predator” those same people will look right past the nice guy who is doing nice things in public for youth and their parents, all the while committing their crimes in private.

We can come together now and teach others that – in order to prevent nice guy/gal offenders from abusing our children – we need to define who they are, how to recognize them, and what to do if we think we see them. If we don’t shout loudly about the lessons we have learned here in mid-Michigan, we won’t be doing our part to help other communities root out this evil that might exist in their midst.

To that end, two forums have been scheduled in mid-Michigan in September that will help shed light on this specific type of predator. Please reach out if you can help in any way. Here is the current schedule of events: